


Follow the Stars

by Piyopuff



Category: Original Work
Genre: 1800's, 1900's, F/F, F/M, Fantasy, Magic, Original Fiction, Stars, Steampunk, Tragic Romance, War, YA, edwardian, young adult
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-08-02
Updated: 2016-08-02
Packaged: 2018-07-28 21:44:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,903
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7657810
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Piyopuff/pseuds/Piyopuff
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Feisty 17 year old Lavina is tired of observing the war from the comfortable safety of aristocracy. However, being conscripted to her enemy - The Royalists - had not been her plan. Now on the run with her childhood friend, she begins to learn there are more than two sides to a war. And even more conflict in life itself.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter One

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for taking the time to read! 
> 
> This novel was written for NaNoWriMo 2011. Some of it has undergone rewriting since thing, but some chapters will be a lot draft-y than others. My goal is to upload the story in its messy entirety and edit/rewrite/refine from there.
> 
> This is a big leap for me and I hope you can get something out of it as well!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chapter one - Lavina begins her journey into a confusing adulthood--and an even more confusing world of dangerous politics.

"I expect you to be well dressed today. And on your best behaviour." Our mother told us as the day began. Company wasn't unusual, our parents hosted guests often, but this was one of those times. My brother would be sent outside to play until tea. I was to remain in my room.

Sheets of slick rain spilled from the heavens and rattled windowpanes in their force. Today was not a day for young women to be out anyway. 

"If you make a sight of yourself you know the fit mother will have." I warned, pulling the synthetic material of the slicker over his head and tying it under his chin. Bright eyes watched me anxiously as he stepped from foot to foot.

"Okaii, Laviia!" he replied, pushing my hands away.

I smiled tightly, missing the childhood freedom. When the Official left we would have to return to the hall to greet him, which left a lot of time to kill. I headed back to my third floor bedroom to pine.

The only thing I knew about these meetings was that they were martial. The civil war didn't affect us much. We lived in territory occupied by the Savita Commune, assuring us an element of stability. Taxes and tariffs weren't a problem either considering the life we had as part of Bartouque's upper class.

I remained in my room for quite a while, catching up on reading, working through some of my private study. Waiting. Waiting and waiting—until the rain picked up and the wide line of oaks that boarded the drive began scraping their branches together like the restless companies of soldiers we had seen marched through the city. Certainly mother and father wouldn't approve of my brother being out in this kind of weather, he being only six.

I changed from my morning dress then—I would've had to anyway, mother would certainly want me wearing something better than a house dress to greet the Official—and tiptoed down the staircase that led from the third to second floor. From here things would become tricky. I continued, plodding slowly down the spiral staircase that led to the first floor. My thick stockings slid over the icy polished mahogany. I was raised to be a lady, after all, and I was practised in not making noise as I descended stairs. 

The main floor of our house was lain out so that each room connected to as many others as possible. This was helpful for not getting lost—almost every way led back to the parlour and dining rooms. But for my mission, it was less than ideal.

The meeting room was located at the back of the home, as was the mud room. I would need to risk detection to find my warm mantle and borrow some boots. And I was not going outside without either.

I left the hall through the door to the study, eyes lowered to trace along the verdant designs to the carpet. The rain could still be heard, thundering, looking to flood the whole state it seemed. All of the lights were off and I didn't dare change that. I would be in enough trouble as it was.

The right door of the study took me though a quick dark hallway and into my mother's favourite parlour. Polished mahogany and daunting scarlet wallpaper made me feel awfully crushed. The last time I had made the mistake of coming in here, I had been flayed. I pushed onward, brushing back my chestnut hair for something to do.

Two more dark halls and one room weighed down with furniture, and I was to the rear of the house. At the right end of this corridor were oriental style sliding doors, the shadow of the dining table and three figures barely visible due to the twilight of the clouds.

I kept as much gown as I could off of the floor, pulling to the left toward an immaculate sunroom that led back onto the patio garden. Hidden in a deep inset closet was mud gear for my brother. Young women, like myself, did not go out in mud. But I couldn't leave my brother to completely ruin his clothes—I would probably catch hell for that too.

Silence had been a reassuring theme throughout my treks. When I pulled open the door the sound of low voices almost gave me a heart attack. I dropped the door. It slammed behind me. The voices stopped and so did my breathing. Rain was the only noise left in the world.

Someone coughed. "Well," a deep voice mused.

The noise seemed to be coming from the right. The meeting, of course. But there were at least three brick walls between...

"Nothing of any matter. The winter rains are bad this season, eh?" my father replied, chuckling out the anxiety that rode on his voice.

"Little early for the winter rains, it's only September. Troops'll probably be havin' a good time, though." The unfamiliar voice said back. It sounded like a low roaring fire, beautiful and dominating all in one. But still...

The laundry chute, I realised with a start. I had played a game when I was a young lady maybe of eleven years or so. My parents had spent the evening away, and our maids and nurse had spent the whole night dedicated to my brother, sick with the flu and an ear infection both. I, left to my own devices, decided to run around the home pretending I was a maid myself, making a juvenile map of the mysterious mansion I had been employed to. I had never been to the basement before then. It had been a wonderful pretend.

This one, this chute joined to the kitchen next door. I was sure they convened and then went downward. I hadn't been in the kitchen much either, but the servants and maids had been dismissed for the day, as was how these special days went, and maybe, if the doors into the dining room were open to the kitchen, the voices would carry.

"We're falling away from the matter at hand, gentlemen." My mother reprimanded. Her voice was higher and harder to discern through the pounding of the weather.

I took another step forward. I needed to find my brother—but something told me to stop. Something told me to listen. Another something told me I could be betraying national secrets. If I found something out I knew I would cave as a prisoner of war. I wasn't this kind of a daughter.

"Alright, no need for that. Now, Lavina will be more than happy to accept your generous offer. Our commutation will be reduced to... well, we won't have an issue keeping the Savita at bay, will we?"

My knees, hidden beneath several layers of cotton and silk, began to feel weak. Utmost attention paid to each movement, I gathered these skirts and lowered myself to onto my knees beside the copper chute, gently pulling down the rough handle.

A creak echoed, my heart jumped. The voices settled into silence.

"Really, now, this is just ridiculous." My father coughed again. It's just the weather, I eased to them in my thoughts. All of these noises are just the weather.

Another gap of silence

"You'll be able to pay, when you take into account her salary."

Things simply weren't adding up. I was told I would never take a job. As a woman, I was to marry and have children. And no one in Bartouque would dare pledge loyalty to the Royalists while we were occupied. But here my parents were, doing it anyway, and paying. What was this? I was being sent—sold, essentially, to our enemy, so my parents could pay the ones occupying us?

I lowered myself down onto my heels, skirt and petticoat doing the same, looking as drab as I felt. I leaned into the wood paneled wall as I listened now, pressing one petite hand to it to be sure the world stayed real.

"She'll be an ambulatory nurse for the frontlines of Cryil." The Official stated. "I can personally escort her, if it would easy your minds at all. Or I could send her westward by train, neither would be faster than the other. She seems quite adept for the job, Rhudaren, Lady Rhudaren." I pictured the traitor man smiling evilly, drumming his fingers on our dark table. Reassuring my parents with hopeless lies. My stomach seemed to twist, informing me of the coming danger.

"Yes, as long as she won't be fighting herself. Ho, could you imagine that! Poor little thing, war is certainly not a woman's affair, is it!"

The Royalists were mad with power, directionless without a leader. They had lost their dignity early into this war but continued ploughing through Astarenovia, repressing anyone who wasn't human. Only those in the northern most divisions followed them, and even they had never been given a choice. The intense patriotism of the soldiers to their fallen king was dangerous to oppose.

"There are a few more papers to be signed, sir, if you'd please. You'll have to deal with the Commune as well, as regrettable as it is, to work out your payment."

I resigned myself not to cry. But how could they? I was to be sent away to save them coin, though I had only returned from finishing school two months earlier. I hadn't lived with them for years, and we had barely seen each other. And now I was disposable?

Three knocks on the back door in rapid fire sent me sprawling backwards with a yelp. My first thought was indecency, my second to the fact that I had certainly been found out. The boy came bouncing through the door a moment later.

"I saw you 'der, Laviia! So I 'tought I might knock, case I interrupted you." Soaking and dishevelled my brother stared at me innocently. Water from his ebony hair rain rivulets down his cheeks, into the corners of his permanent childhood smile.

I was even closer to breaking down. Steadying myself against the wall, I stood slowly, purposefully shutting the chute with my hand as I did so. "I'm going to leave. Don't tell mother and father. I've got very important things to do."

Paying little mind he stripped off his coat and discarded it onto the floor. "Oh. Bye, then." He bent to begin on his boots.

He didn't even understand. Maybe one day. Maybe one day I'd be his hero for this daring escape... I'll be back when it all blows over, I promised to myself. Maybe a few weeks. Maybe when the war ends.

The dining room door opened with a slam. Flittering with anxiety, I ripped open the door to the sunroom and burst out into the hall. "Hey!" my brother called in excitement after me. But I didn't have time, I was flying through the next door before they had a chance to make sense of things. I was in the next hallway over when I heard more slamming and an enraged cry of my name from my father. I was afraid of him. For the first time in my life, I was physically afraid of my own father. If I were to be caught now I would be dead, worse than dead.

I entered into the Burgundy Parlour again, parents both close behind, father catching up. Familiar sights flashed around me, even more menacing than when I was on my reconnaissance mission for my brother. My heart leaped in and out of my throat. Adrenaline padded my arms and legs and threatened to control me completely. I reached the hall suddenly and panicked again, trying to speed up past the main staircase. My stockings tripped me up, almost sending me over backwards. I would reach the stairs of the right wing, I'd get to my room I'd grab another dress or one of my habits and run, and keep running.

One more corner swooped around brought me back onto carpet. "Lavina Rosaura Rhudaren!" my father thundered, the wrath of a thousand skies seemed to push from his voice. "If you don't stop now, you'll be thrown to the Rashasha and torn up for meat!"

He probably wasn't exaggerating. That was why I had to run. Digging my toes into the carpet I pushed harder, mouth dry and throbbing with my heart now. Like a thousand tiny pinpricks on my tongue.

I knew I'd gain time as I bounded up to the second storey. Father's knees certainly weren't what they had been once. The shouting was louder, though, the threats becoming worse and worse. By the time I had come around the next turn in the upstairs main hall, I knew I had enough time. I decelerated to a more comfortable run and, panting, finally made it to my third floor room.

It all looked the same but inside things had changed. Trembling from exertion, I stumbled to my dresser, pulling out a few items I thought I would need and packed them in what had once been my school satchel. I threw on another overdress after that, bracing for the rain I was sure to face. Then I removed my warmest cloak from deep in the closet and threw it over my ensemble messily. Though it felt like an eternity had passed, my clock read not a minute later. And I didn't have time to spare, either. The ruckus of cries and protesting wooden stairs had reached the third floor.

I ran through the halls again like I might only have seconds to escape. Shouts rang through the empty halls. I pushed out breaths as fast as I ran, gripping tightly to my bag with one hand and to my skirts with another. There would be no way to make it through the front of the house, but I had another plan. I dove through dark secondary halls leading a twisted route to the back of the house.

Throwing open a set of plain doors let me into the servant's quarters. I had only been here once, I was mostly working off of intuition as I beat the carpet, worn down from hundreds of feet over time. It was grey all around; the floor and the walls and the ceilings, but that could have come from a lack of light too. Everywhere was dark. I didn't know how to switch on these lights and the gloom from outside seeped in.

I was at the very edge of the house now, I figured. They wouldn't think that I would take this route. Through these quarters, down the stairs that connected with the kitchen for ease of access and out the door off the back. From there into the forest.

I had reached stairs now, they were nothing like the ones I had taken at the front of the house. These ones were barren stone, undecorated. Things like that weren't important now, I had to escape.

I listened carefully when I reached the kitchen. No one seemed to be in the hallway beyond—I was safe for now. I dashed through the dining room and into the hall, booking my speed until I reached the sunroom again. From here I heard the rain. I didn't want to leave, even if I was I was burning beneath all of my collars

The boots I retrieved from the closet were designed for our wet winters. They were made especially with a synthetic canvas lining, the outer side tough brown leather. With any luck they would be able to keep my feet dry in this awful weather.

I missed several off the loops when I was doing my laces. I was still rushing to try and avoid detection. Then I fixed my hood over my head and tied it off, thrusting open the door and plunging myself from what had been safe and warm out into the cold and unknown. I would use the forest that ringed this part of the house for cover, I decided. I would head to the inner city.

Rain beat me down as I ran. Though my lead was plentiful I wasn't ready to take any leisure. I pushed and sweat stuck twists of hair to my face, mud sullying the hem of my dresses in record time. I had one specific location in mind, my one long shot to cling to.


	2. Prologue

The resonance of what had happened was yet to strike me.

My vision sped like collage of greying photographs-there was the wood of the threshold, my hands in front of me, the gun, discarded, disappeared beneath the fresh snow, and Wray. Wray's face as he lifted mine, easing our eyes to meet. 

But I could only stare at those dry cracked lips, purpling from the storm, moving soundlessly.

The world had been drained of all sound aside the ringing in my ears. I was dumbstruck. I was shell-shocked. Wray carefully left my side. The hearty winter storm continued around me. Ice wind penetrated my simple night dress. The cold snow had begun to melt into my hair. I could feel it running down the back of my neck.

Wray had gone back inside now. He would send someone more qualified to deal with the situation.

Then I remembered. The tinny deafness alerted me. I had fired that gun.


End file.
